


flipside

by doomcake



Series: Across the Universe [5]
Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Action, Aftermath of Torture, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon, Angst, Domestic Fluff, Drama, Gangsters, Hurt/Comfort, Italian Mafia, M/M, Major Character Injury, Male Slash, Pseudo-medicine, Pseudo-quantum physics, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Yaoi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-09
Updated: 2013-03-09
Packaged: 2017-12-04 23:26:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 16,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/716269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doomcake/pseuds/doomcake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>It takes a week and a half, but Yamamoto finally catches up to Giacomo in Yokohama. </i>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Yamamoto seeks revenge. It's bittersweet, highly unsatisfying, and doesn't solve a damned thing.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>[Part of an ongoing, post-TYL divergent AU arc]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. heads

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer:** Katekyo Hitman Reborn! and all affiliated characters and settings are the creative property of Akira Amano, Shueisha, Weekly Shounen Jump, and any other companies holding the title to its license and distribution (VIZ Media, etc.). Used without permission for non-profitable entertainment purposes.
> 
> \--
> 
> Many thanks to Charlie, Cristina, and Kia for being such wonderful and accommodating quick!betas~ ♥
> 
> \--
> 
> Part 4/? of "Across the Universe" series  
> Chapter 1/2 for this fic.
> 
> **PLEASE NOTE:** This story is part of a prequel arc to "dive" (see the "first" part in this series--AO3 doesn't let us have a "part 0"). Not sure how this might be as a stand-alone fic, so I would recommend reading the previous sections leading up to this story.
> 
> **WARNINGS:** mafia-related violence/torture, suicide (not major characters), strong language (my Gokudera tends to be pretty foul-mouthed), implied past torture  & its aftermath, very mild M/M sexual content, lots of hurt!Gokudera, drugged-to-the-gills!Yamamoto, angst, Dr. Shamal being an asshole.
> 
> RECOMMENDED LISTENING:  
> ♪ [hurricane](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdJDPepGOAM) { 30 seconds to mars }

  
**« f l i p s i d e »**   
_ h e a d s _   


It takes a week and a half, but Yamamoto finally catches up to Giacomo in Yokohama.  
  
Giacomo is nonplussed the day Yamamoto places a heavy hand on his shoulder in a bar, a deadly smile stretched across the Vongola guardian’s face as he leads Giacomo out the back door to the quiet alleyway. Three of Yamamoto’s most trusted subordinates flank Giacomo as they walk towards the garage. The only sign of a fight that the ex-Vongola retainer puts up happens at the parking garage, when he snatches his elbow back from Yamamoto before straightening his jacket and climbing into the dark sedan on his own terms, sandwiched in between Yamamoto’s subordinates. But he doesn’t try to run.  
  
In the rear view mirror, Giacomo actually looks smug. It makes Yamamoto’s blood _boil_.  
  
“Yoshida,” he says coldly, firmly.  
  
Yoshida, one of the subordinates in the back, nods and wordlessly reaches for the pocket in the liner of his suit jacket, fishing out a black sack that he pulls down over Giacomo’s head. There’s only a surprised grunt (perhaps it’s a protest, but Yamamoto doesn’t care) in response, and Yamamoto drives to the docks in silence.  
  
  
  
  
  
“If you think you’re going to get anything useful out of me, Vongola Rain, you’re making a grievous mistake,” Giacomo says in heavily-accented Japanese.  
  
Giacomo’s smug expression still sticks to his face like a tight rubber mask, even after it’s interrupted by a wince and a hiss when Yamamoto viciously tightens the twine bindings around his wrists and ankles. They’re alone in a low-ceilinged, cement-walled side room in an empty, Vongola-owned warehouse. A single lamp (covered in dust and cobwebs) offers just enough harsh light to see by; the rest of the room is decorated with the sole rickety chair that Giacomo currently occupies.  
  
Something in the back of Yamamoto’s mind tells him that he’s making a mistake, that this isn’t how Tsuna’s mafia should be run—but every time he catches the haughty upturn of Giacomo’s thin lips, the hairs on the back of his neck bristle. All he can see is this smirk on the face of the man that betrayed and nearly stole Gokudera’s life, and Yamamoto isn’t going to let him get away with it so easily.  
  
Yamamoto whirls and pins Giacomo with a glare. “What did you do to him?”  
  
“Who, your little lover boy?” Giacomo laughs when Yamamoto flinches. “What, is he not spreading his legs for you anymore? Shame, really; I thought you two made a cute couple.”  
  
It takes effort for Yamamoto to avoid grinding his teeth and letting Giacomo’s words get to him. “That’s not what this is about, and you know it,” he says flatly.  
  
“Oh, sorry, I forgot we were talking _serious business_ here.” Giacomo laces his tone with poison and mockery. “Lover’s spats: they’re so _distracting_ , aren’t they? Sometimes they make you forget you’re a professional criminal. Convenient.”  
  
This time, Yamamoto doesn’t hold his reaction back—he pulls a fist and punches Giacomo across a cheekbone. Shaking the dull twinge of pain out of his hand, he starts walking in a half-circle around Giacomo’s chair, like a predator stalking its prey and trying to find a weakness.  
  
“That’s not why you tried to kill him.”  
  
A snort, and Giacomo says, “What, kill him for being a faggot? Don’t be ridiculous; I’m not _that_ homophobic.”  
  
“Then why didn’t you just kill him?”  
  
“Hah, this is rich. You’re wondering why your boyfriend got out alive instead of being grateful that he lives.” This time, Yamamoto does grit his teeth, but Giacomo isn’t looking in his direction anyway. At least, not at first—when he turns his head, he meets Yamamoto’s eyes dead-on with a serious expression. His cheek is already starting to swell. “We’re Mafioso, Yamamoto. It’s not like we just kill when it’s convenient; there’s always information involved somewhere under all those layers. You’re in a war—it’s not like we went after him for the fun of it.” Giacomo smirks, almost managing to look wistfully nostalgic. “Though I must admit it was kinda fun.”  
  
Without another word, Yamamoto punches him across the face again. And again, when he thinks he sees a victorious glint in Giacomo’s eyes. And a third, fourth, fifth time—black rings are forming under Giacomo’s eyes, and a blow to his nose has blood dripping down his mouth in twin rivulets. Yamamoto pauses for just a moment, until he sees Giacomo’s shoulders relax, then he socks him again one more time for good measure.  
  
Giacomo glares at him through bruised, half-closed eyes.  
  
“Who had you target Gokudera?”  
  
“I’m a one-man army.”  
  
Yamamoto hits him hard enough to make his knuckles sting and throb this time. He isn’t sure, but he thinks he might be finally wearing Giacomo down.  
  
“You’re a piss-poor liar, Giacomo. Who contracted you?”  
  
“Nobody _contracted_ me,” Giacomo snarls. “It’s not like I’m a mercenary.”  
  
“What _famiglia_?”  
  
“My _what_? Your Italian is still abysmal, Yamamoto. Speak in words I understand—”  
  
Without missing a beat, Yamamoto lets his fists fly once more. This time, he thinks he feels a cheekbone give a little under his fist. He doesn’t stop there—he reaches behind Giacomo and grabs one of his fingers before the Italian man can react and ball his fingers into a fist. With a swift, vicious jerk, the bone cracks under the pressure and this time, Giacomo screams. He works his jaw, blinking moisture from his bloodshot eyes—which are narrowed in crazed-looking fire in Yamamoto’s direction. When Yamamoto raises his fist again, Giacomo sputters and cuts him off.  
  
“Wait! F-Fine, fine. It’s not like my telling you will make any difference.”  
  
Yamamoto keeps his fist raised, but he pauses and raises an eyebrow expectantly. There’s a little voice in the back of his mind that tells him he should be worried; he ignores it and schools his face into an expression he hopes is blank.  
  
“And what is that supposed to mean?”  
  
“You won’t understand this just yet, but you will—my Lord is a fearsome man, Yamamoto. He’s the supreme leader of Gesso—” The name hits Yamamoto like a kick to the chest, and he sucks in a sharp breath that Giacomo doesn’t notice. “—But you probably haven’t heard of us before, since we haven’t even had our debut.”  
  
Clenching his teeth hard enough to feel his molars creaking painfully against each other, Yamamoto’s mind is racing. He knew Giacomo was bad news—he knows now, though, that he had _no idea_ just how bad the news is. He manages to grit out, “Your boss is Byakuran.”  
  
It’s Giacomo’s turn to be surprised, and he doesn’t hide it very well. With a few startled blinks and a slight jerk, he gives Yamamoto a questioning look for a split second, but then manages to relax his shoulders with a sigh. It’s too late for the ruse—and they both know it.  
  
“Ah, so his reputation precedes him more than I realized. You’ve spoken with Gokudera, no doubt.” Giacomo snorts a soft laugh. “Lord Byakuran is quite a genius when it comes to technological research, after all. He has technology in the works that will rival the Vongola’s famous time-influencing weaponry.” Pausing, he blinks and manages to look a little sheepish—it’s a feigned gesture as well, but Giacomo doesn’t seem to mind keeping up that particular façade. “Ah, but I’ve said too much already. It matters not, though; Gokudera will never finish those projects, not after my Lord is done with him.”  
  
Those words send a jolt of fear that strikes like a stab of ice through Yamamoto’s chest. Even though Gokudera is likely in immediate danger, Yamamoto knows he needs more information to go off of than this in order to make tracking down Giacomo worthwhile. It takes a monumental effort not to show his concern this time, but Yamamoto manages, because he has to.  
  
“You overestimate Byakuran’s abilities, then.” He narrows his eyes and meets Giacomo’s gaze dead-on. “He obviously is afraid of something if he’s having you go after Gokudera. What is in Gokudera’s projects is so important that you’re this desperate to get your hands on it?”  
  
Giacomo’s laughter is startling—it sends a chill down Yamamoto’s spine. “So Gokudera hasn’t even told _you_ what he’s working on? Isn’t that convenient.”  
  
Yamamoto resists the urge to grab the man by the collar and shake him. Instead, he raises his fist again in warning. “What do you know?” he asks, coldly.  
  
“More than you, apparently. But it’s not like knowing will give you any sort of advantage.” Giacomo smirks before he continues. “The machine Gokudera is building will fine-tune the natural ability that Lord Byakuran possesses. It shouldn’t be surprising that we wouldn’t want that ability to fall into the wrong hands.”  
  
Images of Byakuran’s deadly ability to gather information from across universes comes to Yamamoto’s mind. It’s been almost ten years since then, but the horrors of what they faced in the future are still crystal-clear in everyone’s minds. Yamamoto’s mind is working a thousand thoughts a second as it slowly dawns on him what Gokudera has likely been working on. He isn’t sure of the details, like what the machine Gokudera is building actually _does_ , but now he has a _general_ idea of what the Storm Guardian is messing with.  
  
It’s unsettling, to say the least.  
  
“You mean to tell me that Gokudera is messing with parallel universes?”  
  
The naked shock on Giacomo’s face is all the answer that Yamamoto needs. Once the surprise wears off, it’s replaced with a narrow-eyed look that holds none of the smirking confidence Giacomo displayed just a short while back. The murderous aura suddenly surrounding the man has the hair on the back of Yamamoto’s neck standing on end.  
  
“You obviously know more about this than you let on, Rain Guardian,” Giacomo hisses.  
  
The tables are turning, and Yamamoto feels a small thrill of victory shoot through his veins, because he’s finally on the right track. “But Gokudera knows something about this technology that Byakuran doesn’t, and he wants it. That’s why you didn’t kill him before—you wanted the details.” If Giacomo’s darkening expression is anything to go by, Yamamoto is right on target, and is only continuing down the correct path. “And if Byakuran can’t get the information he wants, he’d rather it die as a secret with Gokudera than let the Vongola have it.” He smiles, but the thought of Gokudera being in serious danger bleeds it of humor or smug victory. “Am I wrong?”  
  
It only takes a few heartbeats for Yamamoto’s words to fully sink in. The silence is heavy with tension in those few moments, though, and it makes Giacomo’s sudden outburst of chuckling even more chilling. What starts as a small laugh escalates slowly into ridiculous cackles, and finally reaches full-blown hysteria. Yamamoto stands by in stoic silence as he watches Giacomo finally break. Still unsettling; there is small comfort in victory here.  
  
The laughter dies much faster than it escalated. After a moment of quietly staring at the floor, Giacomo looks up with a crazed grin stretching his lips thin. “And here I thought you were the idiotic one.”  
  
“I’ve heard that before,” Yamamoto replies uncertainly.  
  
A few more disturbed giggles, and then Giacomo says, “Ah, well, I guess I’ve been caught, then—I have nothing more for you, Vongola Rain. Just heed my words: even your precious Gokudera’s technology can’t defeat Lord Byakuran’s genius. Sawada is weak. My lord is hardly one to be trifled with; he will become the leader of the next generation of the Mafia world.”  
  
Yamamoto snorts, because he knows how _that_ ends—but when he goes to punch Giacomo just for spite, Giacomo suddenly opens his mouth wide for a split second, working his tongue around his back teeth. It’s such a strange gesture that it throws Yamamoto off; he pauses just long enough for the elder Italian man to clamp his teeth down with a sharp click. Giacomo’s laughter is back, but there’s an ominous, resigned quality to the guffaws that are coming from his lips—which are turning _blue_ , Yamamoto suddenly notices right about the first round of coughing that escapes those same lips.  
  
Gasping for breath, Giacomo wheezes and laughs all at the same time as Yamamoto grabs his coat lapels with gritted teeth. “What did you do?” Yamamoto hisses, giving his captive a good shake.  
  
But the man never answers him. Giacomo’s skin then turns an unnatural color of pink, eyes rolling until Yamamoto can only see the white. And suddenly, his captive violently thrashes against the binds—Yamamoto lets go, as if burned. In a matter of moments, the tremors thoroughly shaking Giacomo’s body cease, and the man’s breathing stutters to a halt. He slumps against his bonds and doesn’t move. Yamamoto waits a few seconds before pressing two fingers to his neck, hissing in frustration when he doesn’t find any sign of a pulse.  
  
 _Goddamn it—cyanide. The bastard had a suicide pill_ , Yamamoto realizes. _Shit._  
  
Running a shaking hand through his hair, he remembers Giacomo’s not-so-veiled threats against Gokudera’s current safety. With a sharp intake of air, Yamamoto shoves a hand in his pocket (hissing as his bruised, raw knuckles brush against the cloth) and fishes out his cell phone to hit the speed-dial for Gokudera’s mobile number. The call goes straight to voicemail.  
  
Yamamoto snaps his phone shut. “ _Goddamn_ it.”  
  
When he emerges outside of the warehouse in a rush, he greets his waiting subordinates with, “Take care of the body,” before he runs to his car. He barely notices the curt nods of acknowledgement before he’s squealing out of the parking lot, because he can’t get back to Namimori fast enough.  
  
  
  
  
  
The first place Yamamoto goes upon his return is the apartment he shares with Gokudera. His mind tells him that Gokudera’s office would have likely been a better place to start looking for him, but his feet lead him straight to his own doorstep before he can even think about where he’s headed. Without pretense, he flings open the door and nearly stumbles into the room—only to see Tsuna half-sitting, half-leaning on the bar-counter next to the kitchen. Blinking in confusion, Yamamoto frowns as his eyes first meet Tsuna’s calm gaze, then travel down to the sling holding his left arm closely to his chest.  
  
“Welcome back, Yamamoto,” Tsuna says with a tired smile.  
  
Yamamoto feels his lips moving, gaping like a fish, but he can’t help it as his mind tries to figure out what’s going on. “Y-You’re not—”  
  
“No, I’m not Gokudera-kun.” Tsuna sighs, looking sore and exhausted as he pushes himself off the edge of the counter to stand at full height. “Gokudera-kun is resting in the bedroom.” A million questions pop into Yamamoto’s mind, but Tsuna doesn’t look like he’s done speaking yet. He pauses, and then, “You’re probably wondering why I’m here in your apartment.”  
  
“What happened?” Yamamoto pointedly flicks his gaze briefly down at Tsuna’s bound arm.  
  
Tsuna walks up to Yamamoto and places his free hand on Yamamoto’s shoulder. “You’re not going to like this, Yamamoto, but there was an accident the other day—”  
  
On reflex, Yamamoto flinches and sucks in air sharply—even though a part of him _knew_ this was probably coming, the news still hits him like a blow to the gut. Tsuna tightens his grip on Yamamoto’s shoulder, directing him to sit in one of the chairs at the kitchen table as he continues speaking.  
  
“—but it seems as though you might have been expecting as much,” Tsuna says without missing a beat. “I was hoping you might, since I couldn’t tell if it was me being targeted, or Gokudera-kun.”  
  
With a frown, Yamamoto asks, “You’re not sure?” When Tsuna shakes his head, he narrows his eyes and asks again, “ _What happened_?”  
  
“Gokudera-kun and I were walking near the front gate of the base, and suddenly a car swerved off the street and drove straight at us. We both dove different directions to get out of the way, but the car looked like it was following Gokudera-kun—I couldn’t really tell, since the car clipped me on the way by.” Tsuna slightly raises the arm in the sling with a tight-lipped grimace. “He got hit—” Tsuna holds out a hand to still Yamamoto’s reaction, “he’s banged up and pretty badly bruised, but otherwise okay.”  
  
It takes all of Yamamoto’s willpower for him to not spring to his feet and go check on Gokudera himself, because he has a sinking feeling that Tsuna isn’t telling him the entire truth. Last he saw, Gokudera still walked with a limp and isn’t the type to lay around with unfinished projects still at hand. Giacomo’s warning lingers in his mind like a scathing taunt, and it’s both infuriating and terrifying to know that the rat bastard’s words didn’t come from the false bravado of a dying man. **  
  
**“You don’t know who did it?” Yamamoto asks darkly.  
  
Again, Tsuna shakes his head. “That’s why I was hoping you might know something about it.”  
  
Yamamoto chews on his lip in thought; he isn’t sure how well Tsuna will take the news that he tortured (and indirectly killed) someone once associated with Vongola. It doesn’t matter that they’ve all been through many violent battles and messy political deals together—one thing that Tsuna still can’t handle is mafia-related murder, no matter how just the cause might be in anyone else’s mind.  
  
“I… I had a _talk_ with Giacomo,” Yamamoto says, looking away. He can sense Tsuna tensing at his words, but he continues anyway. “It seems as though Gokudera is working on a project that another family doesn’t exactly approve of, and it was implied that Gokudera would likely be a target.” He pauses, trying to find a delicate way of breaking bad news to Tsuna, but he can’t think of one. “I don’t know how else to say this, but… the Gesso famiglia is on the move, Tsuna. Byakuran is already working on building his Millefiore famiglia.”  
  
Tsuna pales, but otherwise doesn’t seem too surprised by the news—he doesn’t even make the effort to ask where Giacomo is now, because he probably has it figured out. He’s quiet for a few beats before he softly says, “I was afraid of as much.”  
  
“You knew about the Gesso famiglia?”  
  
“I didn’t know for sure, but I had a feeling,” Tsuna replies. “I thought I was being paranoid because we’d been through so much, but I felt like our fight with Byakuran wasn’t over yet—even after we returned from _that_ future.”  
  
Yamamoto wants to feel angry at Tsuna for not sharing his concerns sooner, but they fade as he remembers that it’s hard to act on a feeling when there isn’t any solid proof of it being reality—and it’s even harder to convince others to do the same. With a frustrated sigh, Yamamoto plants his elbows on his knees and rubs his hands over his face and hair tiredly.  
  
“I guess this means we’re going to need to take the steps to make sure that the Gesso famiglia doesn’t get their way this time,” Yamamoto says.  
  
Tsuna nods again. “I’m afraid we have our work cut out for us, but at least we know more about Byakuran from the start this time.”  
  
“We also know that he considers whatever Gokudera’s working on to be a threat.”  
  
Tsuna’s eyes flick to the closed bedroom door before he brings them back to meet Yamamoto’s gaze. “We both know he’d throw away his life for mine. I’ll do what I can to keep him from doing that, but—”  
  
With a soft snort of laughter, Yamamoto cuts him off. “You should know me better than that by now, Tsuna,” he says.  
  
Tsuna grins sheepishly—a wistful tribute to their youth—and dips his head in a half-nod. “I leave him to you, then.”  
  
  
  
  
  
The room is completely dark when Yamamoto enters, but the sliver of light from the hallway reflects off the metal of an IV pole next to the bed. Seeing it makes Yamamoto’s chest flutter in concern, but Tsuna’s words of assurance are on gentle replay in his mind. Tsuna’s presence at the door is another reminder that Gokudera isn’t going to die just yet. Yamamoto’s eyes adjust to the darkened room as he softly walks to the bedside and takes a moment to look over Gokudera for signs of injury.  
  
Gokudera looks peaceful in rest—probably thanks to the drugs in the IV line leading from the crook of his elbow. There’s a square bandage on Gokudera’s cheekbone, which covers the bottom edge of a fading black eye. A blanket covers Gokudera’s torso up to his armpits, leaving only his bare shoulders visible, but there’s just enough of a bruise on Gokudera’s left side peeking out from the blankets to make Yamamoto’s blood run cold. It’s dark, mostly black and red with mottled greens and blues at the slowly-fading edges, and it definitely looks painful. But Gokudera’s face shows none of the pain as he sleeps; a small mercy for which Yamamoto is grateful.  
  
He hesitantly reaches out and brushes Gokudera’s long bangs from his face, taking in the smaller cuts and abrasions that are pink with healing skin.  
  
“Yamamoto,” Tsuna whispers from the doorway. When Yamamoto turns, Tsuna gestures back towards the hallway with a sideways nod. He looks regretfully back down at Gokudera before he follows Tsuna back to the living room, shutting the door to the bedroom softly behind him.  
  
To Yamamoto’s surprise, Shamal is lounging in Yamamoto’s favorite plush chair, somehow managing to look completely comfortable and yet highly irritated all at the same time.  
  
“Shamal,” Yamamoto greets uncertainly. Shamal’s presence renews the knot of worry in Yamamoto’s stomach, because the doctor really has no other reason to be here apart from Gokudera. And he wouldn’t be bothering to be here about Gokudera if it wasn’t bad—  
  
“Kid,” Shamal greets in return, expression pinched. “Now for the record I’m only here because Bianchi promised she’d go on a date with me if I—”  
  
Tsuna pins Shamal with a serious look, and Shamal’s mouth snaps shut mid-tirade as he sits up straighter and clears his throat. Yamamoto waits with barely-managed patience; it’s hard to resist the urge to fidget.  
  
“That brat is gonna be really sore for a while,” Shamal finally says after a moment. “I’m supposed to let you know that I had to cut him open a bit to take care of a few internal injuries, but with rest he’ll be back up to his grouchy, annoying self in no time. But make sure he stays off his bad knee as much as possible, because it was a mess even before this new incident. Now it’s screwed to hell and back if he doesn’t stay off the damn thing.”  
  
 _Tsuna had the right idea, bringing Shamal here_ , Yamamoto decides as he feels the tension in his shoulders relaxing. It’s surprising to him that Shamal actually agreed to be here for Gokudera under circumstances that were less than life-threatening. (It doesn’t matter that everyone knows Shamal cares more about his former charge more than he ever lets on; Yamamoto still worries.) Maybe it just takes hearing Shamal say that Gokudera’s okay to feel better about the situation, though Yamamoto still is really frustrated that he hadn’t been here to protect Gokudera. An entire week with nothing but vengeance on his mind—he hadn’t even _thought_ that Gokudera’s safety would be compromised.  
  
“So you’re telling me to keep doing what I’ve been doing?” Yamamoto asks with a wry grin.  
  
Shamal grunts. “Yeah, I guess I am, kid. I mean it about the knee, though—if he doesn’t let it heal up, he won’t be able to walk without a cane later down the line.”  
  
An image of a cane-wielding, curmudgeonly 25-year-old Gokudera comes to Yamamoto’s mind, and even though it’s totally inappropriate, he can’t suppress the sudden laugh escaping his lips. Tsuna shoots him a concerned look—because rationally, Gokudera being crippled is anything _but_ funny—so Yamamoto manages to cut off his laugh in a hurry, shoulders slumping. Maybe he really is just far too exhausted to make any sense.  
  
“Sorry. I just find it hard to imagine Gokudera with a cane, that’s all,” he says apologetically.  
  
The worry in Tsuna’s furrowed brow doesn’t lessen any further. He regards Yamamoto directly and says softly, “Are you sure you’re okay, Yamamoto?”  
  
Yamamoto blinks—catches himself, and smiles sheepishly. “I’m fine, really. Just tired.”  
  
Admitting as much makes his body feel suddenly heavy and worn, and he can’t battle the urge to yawn any longer. He can’t even remember how many days it’s been since he last slept more than an hour at a time.  
  
Tsuna’s nod is hesitant, skeptical but relenting. “You look like you could use some rest.” He stands and sends a stern look in Shamal’s direction, wordlessly instructing him to do the same. “Come by my office in two days to report in. I expect to not see you until then, Yamamoto.”  
  
Yamamoto gratefully closes the door behind Tsuna and Shamal after they leave, and finds himself slumping against the door as he hears their footsteps retreat down the hallway. All the adrenaline that has kept him on his feet for so long dissipates, but he forces himself to get back to his feet just long enough to crawl into a more comfortable place than the door to sleep.  
  
First, though, his footsteps take him to the bedroom, where Gokudera still sleeps quietly. It’s almost unreal to see Gokudera safe after so many days of uncertainty and worrying that someone would get to the Storm Guardian before he had a chance to get back—and it’s even more unreal after knowing that Yamamoto’s fears aren’t unfounded.  
  
Yamamoto sits on the other half of the bed, careful not to disturb Gokudera’s sleep. Reaching out a hesitant hand, he brushes his fingers along Gokudera’s face once more, as if he’s still trying to convince himself Gokudera’s still alive and (mostly) well. He feels himself sinking further into the bed, and before he realizes what he’s doing, he’s already asleep.  
  
  
  
  
  
Yamamoto wakes up in layers. First comes the realization that he’s warm and comfortable, second is the desire to fall back to sleep, and third is a comforting presence in the form of gentle, strong fingers gently twirling around his hair. It takes a moment of languishing in the half-sleeping cocoon of a moment for Yamamoto to realize that it’s Gokudera sitting next to him, and they’re both still in their shared bed.  
  
Trying not to give himself away, Yamamoto cracks one eye open just enough to find that he’s curling toward Gokudera, who’s dressed in a loose pair of sweatpants and a button-down shirt (hardly the Storm Guardian’s usual fashion-forward fare). Gokudera wears his wire-frame specs as he studiously reads over a piece of paper in his free hand with a light frown. Yamamoto tries not to grin too obviously as he watches his lover concentrate—he’s enjoying the view while he can, because as soon as his cover’s blown, he won’t get to see it so intimately again (for a while, at least).  
  
The fingers suddenly still against his scalp, and Yamamoto snaps his eye back shut.  
  
“I know you’re awake, idiot,” Gokudera says chidingly, tugging on a small pinch of Yamamoto’s hair. “You can stop pretending now.”  
  
Yamamoto opens his eyes again and grins up at Gokudera. “Am I that obvious?” he asks with all the feigned innocence of a puppy caught stealing table scraps.  
  
With a snort, Gokudera removes his hand from Yamamoto’s scalp and uses it to adjust himself a little more upright. (Yamamoto doesn’t miss the stiffness in his movements, or the half-hidden wince.) “You lack subtlety,” he says.  
  
“Hahaha… I thought I was doing pretty well!” It’s hard to get his tired, aching limbs to cooperate, but with a little shifting, Yamamoto manages to inch closer to Gokudera and prop himself up on an elbow. The papers in Gokudera’s hands look like work. “And I thought you were supposed to be taking time off,” Yamamoto says in a low voice, giving the papers a pointed look.  
  
“Yeah, well, either they bring me the work here, or I piss them off and go get it myself,” Gokudera says defensively, tilting the papers so that the words are just out of Yamamoto’s visual range. “They can’t expect me to sit here twiddling my thumbs while doing nothing.”  
  
It’s a good point—Gokudera has never been very good at just _resting_. To him, doing paperwork _is_ resting, though Yamamoto can’t ever relate to that sentiment. Simply watching Gokudera reading work makes Yamamoto more tired. He has a difficult time suppressing a yawn at the thought of more rest; he’s a lot more exhausted than he first realized. Then again, he should’ve known that going a week without more than an hour of sleep per day on average would eventually get to him.  
  
“Are you sure you don’t want to go back to sleep?” Gokudera asks, peering down at Yamamoto over the top of his glasses. “I hear you’ve had a long week—nobody’s gonna stop you.”  
  
Yamamoto tries not to snicker as the cane-waving-Gokudera image crawls back into his mind, complete with oversized bifocals slipping off his nose, and he can’t help but chuckle.  
  
Gokudera scowls at him. “What’s so funny?”  
  
“Nothing,” Yamamoto replies, laughter dissipating into a simple grin.  
  
“Well,” Gokudera wrinkles his nose. “If you’re not going to go back to sleep, would you kindly take a shower? You stink.”  
  
A shower actually sounds pretty good to Yamamoto, because it’s been a while since he had the luxury of taking his time with a long, hot one. Pushing himself to a sitting position, Yamamoto raises an arm and sniffs under his armpit, making a show of wrinkling his nose.  
  
“I think I agree,” he says, leaning in closer to Gokudera’s shoulder. Sporting his best shit-eating grin, he adds, “Rough-and-ragged doesn’t smell good on someone even as good-looking as I am.”  
  
“Oh, shut up,” Gokudera says as he shoves Yamamoto away good-naturedly.  
  
Snickering, Yamamoto turns to drag himself out of the bed, but he freezes when Gokudera’s hand suddenly covers his. He looks back at Gokudera, who isn’t even _looking back_ , the jerk—the fingers close tightly around Yamamoto’s hand for a brief moment. There’s hesitation in Gokudera’s posture, so Yamamoto waits patiently, because he knows from experience that the wait will be worth it.  
  
“I’m glad you’re back,” Gokudera says softly, and after another few quiet seconds, he adds, “Please don’t disappear like that again, or I’ll kill you myself.”  
  
The grin makes Yamamoto’s dry, chapped lips crack a little, but the prickly-warm feeling in his chest makes this moment _entirely_ worth it. Even with the reality of Gokudera’s injuries and the danger they’re both in lurking in the back of his mind, he’s determined to enjoy this moment where he remembers why he fell in love with this pompous, thick-skulled jerk.  
  
“Thank you.” Yamamoto turns his palm over and squeezes back, the urge to spill _everything_ rising with the warm feeling in his chest. “Gokudera, I have to—”  
  
Gokudera cuts him off with a slender finger on Yamamoto’s lips, this time looking him straight in the eyes. “Shower first, and then we’ll talk.” He presses firmly when Yamamoto tries to say something again. “I _promise_.”  
  
It’s a satisfactory enough answer, so Yamamoto simply smiles under Gokudera’s finger before he pushes himself off the bed and stumbles to the bathroom.  
  
Squinting at himself in the mirror in the harsh bathroom light, Yamamoto tilts his face upward to see the patch of stubble growing on his chin. Rubbing it thoughtfully, his fingers brush against the raised skin of the scar line marring the dark hairs growing there, knowing he really needs to shave. He doesn’t want to acknowledge how haggard and wrung-out he looks—dark circles under his eyes, cheeks slightly sunken, hair a disastrous mess—so he focuses on the things he can immediately fix.  
  
  
  
  
  
Gokudera’s asleep, neck craned at an uncomfortable-looking angle against the pillows, when Yamamoto emerges from the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist. With a wince, Yamamoto does his best to towel-dry as much moisture from his hair as he can manage. Gokudera’s hair is soft under his fingertips as Yamamoto gently eases him into a more suitable horizontal position. There’s a fresh glass of water next to the bed, along with an empty, small, plastic pill cup—probably a nurse of some kind had been by to check in. The pills were probably Gokudera’s latest round of painkillers, Yamamoto assumes.  
  
 _So much for talking now_ , Yamamoto thinks, and wonders if Gokudera’s timing is deliberate. But pain is pain, and he hates it when he sees Gokudera’s face lined with it, so Yamamoto can’t find it in himself to even be the least bit angry.  
  
Yamamoto finally takes the time to glance at the clock on the wall, and estimates that he’s managed to get a good ten hours of sleep. His body doesn’t feel it yet, though, and everything feels weighed down as he finds himself gravitating back to bed. He hasn’t been this exhausted in _years_ , not since he last trained extensively with Squalo. It wouldn’t hurt to get more rest, he knows—and Tsuna had essentially ordered him to get some more time off his feet. After pulling on a loose pair of sweats, he eases back under the covers on his half of the bed, careful not to jostle Gokudera in the process.  
  
But no matter how exhausted he feels, or how much he wants to do as ordered, a part of Yamamoto is restless. There are far too many thoughts zooming about in his mind—too many questions, things he needs (and _wants_ ) to say, so many concerns he doesn’t know how to voice without pissing Gokudera off—and sleep is as elusive as ever.  
  
Instead, he rolls over, frowns at the papers sitting on Gokudera’s nightstand for a grand total of thirty seconds before he hops up and snatches them. Hell, even if he can’t understand them, might as well at least give it a try—  
  
  
  
  
  
“How’s he doing?” Tsuna’s expression is as serious as his tone, and it makes Yamamoto fidget a little nervously to be under Tsuna’s full scrutiny.  
  
“I… can’t really tell,” Yamamoto admits with a shallow smile; he’s feeling a little like a failure. “He’s being perfectly civil, and he’s actually following his orders of bed rest—aside from the paperwork he’s managed to sneak into his room. But it’s not… I don’t know, normal?”  
  
Tsuna nods slowly, thinking. “You expected a little more resistance out of him on the bed rest part?”  
  
“I did, because that’s how he usually is—he’s always rebelling against anything and everything that he thinks is an obstacle to any of his goals.” Yamamoto sighs. “So I want to be happy he’s _not_ , for once, but it’s just—I’m really worried.”  
  
“I got the same sense as you did, at first,” Tsuna says after a moment. Yamamoto’s eyes widen at the revelation, because if anything, he knows that Tsuna’s instincts are unnaturally accurate. “But while you were gone, I made sure to spend more time with him. I think he’s mostly worried that in his current state, he feels helpless; it’s that helplessness that’s making him behave, because we’ve all reassured him that he’ll get better if he just takes it easy for a while.”  
  
Yamamoto blinks—he hasn’t really thought of Gokudera’s complacency that way before, but it makes complete sense now that it’s been spelled out clearly for him. Maybe it’s because he forgets that Gokudera is also maturing; that Gokudera isn’t as blindly _stupid_ when it comes to putting Tsuna’s well-being before his own. He’s finally starting to understand what it means to be the Right Hand Man when it comes to his ability to protect Tsuna: if he isn’t in the best possible shape he can be, then he’s going to be useless if something happens to Tsuna.  
  
With a wry snort, Yamamoto says, “So you think he’s finally starting to come around?”  
  
Tsuna shrugs. “I don’t know for sure, but I hope it means he does. I… I hate seeing other people get hurt for my sake.”  
  
That’s one thing about Tsuna that never changes, Yamamoto notes. Even more than that—Tsuna’s entire purpose in finally (reluctantly) agreeing to the title of Vongola Decimo is to protect those close to him. All of his efforts to become strong and to lead the Vongola are all aimed at keeping those around him from hurting, especially for his sake. Yamamoto knows this all too well, and makes it his goal as one of the core members of Vongola to help support Tsuna in his efforts. But no matter how close Yamamoto gets to Gokudera, he can never seem to tell what the Storm Guardian is thinking when it comes to protecting Tsuna.  
  
Even though Tsuna’s point about Gokudera possibly coming to terms with his own well-being as a key factor in his ability to support Tsuna is a valid one, instinct has doubt gnawing at Yamamoto’s insides.  
  
“I hope you’re right,” Yamamoto says with a hopeful smile.  
  
For now, Yamamoto lets it go. 


	2. tails

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _The thought of trying to explain his time in the Russians’ hands to Yamamoto makes Gokudera's stomach churn, even though he knows he will need to address the issue at some point._
> 
>  
> 
> Gokudera's projects are progressing, and he's healing. But it's always a long process, especially when some of the answers come from a part of his memory that he doesn't want to deal with just yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to M, Charlie, and dicks for pre-reading, offering feedback, general hand-holding and encouragement! ♥
> 
> \--
> 
> Part 4/? of "Across the Universe" series  
> Chapter 2/2 for this fic.
> 
> Same warnings/disclaimer as chapter 1.
> 
> RECOMMENDED LISTENING (part 1):  
> ♪ [hurricane](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdJDPepGOAM) { 30 seconds to mars }

**« f l i p s i d e »  
 _t a i l s  
one step forward, two steps back_**

As the bruises fade, Gokudera becomes more restless. It takes him days of badgering to even get Yamamoto to _look_ at him like he _isn’t_ made of glass, and when that doesn’t quite work the way Gokudera wants, he swallows his pride and turns to begging. He points out that he has dutifully taken every painkiller and other pill shoved in his direction; that he rests when told to (“like a normal person,” he adds for effect); that he uses his crutches as instructed and doesn’t strain himself. Gokudera goes so far as to embellish the idea that he isn’t sore or stiff anymore (it’s really not _that_ much of a lie).  
  
Yamamoto raises an eyebrow at the last one, especially when it’s brought up as he’s slaving over a home-cooked meal of Italian-style spaghetti and a glass of syrupy-sweet Zinfandel. They’re both in the kitchen, Yamamoto wearing a half-apron as he sautés mushrooms with garlic to add to the homemade sauce, Gokudera hobbling on his crutch to move closer and press himself against Yamamoto’s back when he makes his case.  
  
“Is that so?” Yamamoto asks once Gokudera pauses, unable to hide the smile from his voice.  
  
With a wicked grin, Gokudera shifts the crutch so he can stand on his tiptoes, putting his chin on the juncture of Yamamoto’s shoulder and neck. A soft breath across the side of Yamamoto’s neck—Gokudera can _feel_ the hairs bristling—and in Yamamoto’s ear he says softly, lustily, “You want me to prove it to you?” He finishes the thought by rocking his hips against Yamamoto’s backside.  
  
The full-body shudder he gets out of Yamamoto is thrilling, and the sharp intake of breath when Gokudera brushes his teeth along an earlobe only serves to goad him on. Gokudera misses _this_ , the push-and-pull he gets out of his relationship with Yamamoto, but he forces himself to focus, because there’s still the goal at hand, and Yamamoto’s just on the edge of giving in—  
  
Okay, so he hadn’t actually _meant_ to use seduction as a tactic to get what he wants, but it’s _working_.  
  
“H- _Hayato_ ,” Yamamoto tries to say firmly, but it comes out as a lusty groan instead. “Th-The mushrooms are burning— _ah_! Haha, ow! _Nngh_ —”  
  
Gokudera’s lips twist into a smirk as they pull away from the welt forming at the base of Yamamoto’s neck. Sending a long puff of air through his nose over the mark, he pulls back slowly.  
  
“What was it you were saying about _laying low_ , again?” Gokudera says innocently ( _hah!_ ).  
  
Yamamoto pulls the pan of sizzling mushrooms off the heat and turns around to stare down Gokudera, jaw working and cheeks pink with conflicted embarrassment. Yamamoto knows he’s been played, but can’t seem to figure out what to do about it. Searching Gokudera’s eyes, Yamamoto finally sighs and slumps his shoulders.  
  
“Okay, haha, I get it—you win this game,” he finally says, chuckling. Gokudera blinks, because he hadn’t expected this little display to end so _easily_ (but he won’t admit he’s a little disappointed). Yamamoto rubs a hand through his hair in agitation. “Just… come back tonight before bedtime?”  
  
He looks so pathetic and _hopeful_ that Gokudera has to swallow thickly before answering. “Y-Yeah,” he says, but then frowns. “I’m not leaving before dinner, though— _idiot_.” The last word is a soft, affectionate afterthought.  
  
Yamamoto beams brightly, sending warmth shooting down Gokudera’s spine all the way to his toes. “Haha, I hope not! It’s going to be really good!”  
  
When Yamamoto turns back around to work on their half-prepared dinner, Gokudera presses a hand to his forehead and snorts mirthlessly. He really hadn’t anticipated Yamamoto to give in with so little resistance, especially after all the nervous fluttering and worry Yamamoto has displayed of late. It kind of pisses him off, though he isn’t sure why.  
  
They still haven’t spoken about… a lot of things, such as where Yamamoto went during his week-long absence. Yamamoto hasn’t breathed a word about the time away, though Gokudera hasn’t tried asking. Gokudera knows he has no right to be so concerned over the lack of forthcoming information—it makes him a hypocrite—but he can’t help himself. It’s just as Yamamoto said about concern being a natural instinct, though the realization that Yamamoto is right simply… stings.  
  
Then again, Gokudera hasn’t exactly been forthcoming on the projects he’s working on, and why he’s being targeted, and the fact that Byakuran is presenting himself as a serious threat much sooner than anticipated. And…  
  
 _Giacomo’s smirk is hideous and cruel over the haze of fever and pain and softly-spoken Russian. The roaring fire in his back almost drowns out the Italian’s words, but Gokudera can read his lips as plain as day: “Byakuran is already on the move, and even with your little machine, you cannot stop him.”_  
  
Gokudera shudders, the movement sending a remnant ache through the freshly-healed gunshot wound in his back. It’s hard to forget the sheer amount of _pain_ he was in after they’d done a temporary patch-up job in the dirty basement of that mall—their only goal had been to keep him breathing long enough to get information on how to decode G-Script. And when his condition began to improve despite the poor after-care, they’d beaten him black and blue and destroyed his knee. The thought of trying to explain his time in the Russians’ hands to Yamamoto makes Gokudera’s stomach churn, even though he knows he will need to address the issue at some point.  
  
Still quivering from the recollection, Gokudera fidgets with the half-empty box of cigarettes in his sweater pocket. The coy, seductive impulse—and the regret that it hadn’t been seen through to a more pleasurable end—turns to molten lead in his stomach; the air in the room feels stale in his dry mouth as he steps back and fights the urge to just _get out, getout—_  
  
“I’ll be right back,” Gokudera says, not waiting for Yamamoto to acknowledge the statement before hobbling to the porch.  
  
Leaning against his favorite spot on the railing, he lights up as he looks over the back end of the Vongola estate. The smoke feels delicious as it travels over his tongue and down the back of his throat. Whenever he needs to clear his thoughts, this always is the easiest way—already, he can feel the restlessness fading from his mind and limbs.  
  
“Hey.” Gokudera looks over his shoulder. Yamamoto’s voice is soft, laced with a hint of concern as he leans against the sliding door leading to the porch. “You okay?”  
  
“Peachy,” he says gruffly around the cigarette. He drops the butt on the ground and crushes it with his heel as he blows the last pull of smoke in a steady stream from his lips. “Just peachy.”  
  
The frown lines on Yamamoto’s forehead crease further, but he doesn’t say anything else except, “Dinner’s ready, if you’re still hungry.”  
  
Grabbing his crutch, Gokudera wordlessly follows him back inside. _Guess who the idiot is now._  
  
  
  
  
  
Gokudera begins to wonder if there’s some sort of conspiracy brewing to keep him from finding an opportune time to speak with Yamamoto. After unsuccessfully attempting to be productive in his lab, Gokudera hobbles back to his apartment only to find it empty when he returns around nine-thirty that evening. There’s a note on the kitchen counter in Yamamoto’s messy scrawl:  
  


> _Tsuna wanted to see me; I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you got back. I might be back late—you need your rest, so don’t wait up for me, okay?_
> 
> _-Takeshi_

The small pang of jealousy in Gokudera’s chest is hard to ignore; he’s feeling a little left out of the loop. Just because he’s been ordered to lay low doesn’t mean he’s _dead_ , goddamn it. He makes his way to the bedroom in a huff, ignoring the stiff discomfort in his knee when he drops the crutch at the bathroom door and limps his way through his pre-bedtime routine.

Halfway through brushing his teeth, Gokudera taps his toothbrush a little too roughly against a still-loose tooth in the back of his mouth. With a wince and a toothpaste-spitting curse, he pulls the toothbrush from his mouth; there’s a smear of red along the side of the bristles. Rubbing the tip of his tongue against the sore tooth absent-mindedly, he loses his thoughts in the reminder of how his tooth came to be loose in the first place.

The images aren’t pleasant. Mostly they have to do with Russian-accented badmouthing and threats that didn’t fall so idly when one has already been made aware of the reality of the consequences. Clenching his teeth, the sharp pain in the injured tooth brings Gokudera back to the present, still with a mouth full of toothpaste and a bloody toothbrush clutched in a white-knuckled hand.

Okay, so maybe he isn’t as _okay_ as he’d like everyone to think he is. But that isn’t the issue, because there isn’t time to wallow in what happened to him. Every second he spends languishing is a second he could be spending ensuring that the Tenth is safe—that his _famiglia_ is protected. It’s hard to feel useful when he tires every three hours even after doing something as mundane as hunching over a set of equations, or when he can’t even walk down the hallway without the aid of his crutch.

He rinses the toothpaste and blood out of his mouth, glares at his own reflection in the mirror— _I am not fucking useless_ , he mouths to himself—and determinedly stomps to the kitchen to make a pot of coffee. (Screw the fact that he’s just brushed his teeth.) There’s work that he can do—that only _he_ can do—and he isn’t about to sit about idly like a goddamned invalid.

His earlier lack of success in the lab doesn’t keep him from going back again, now with the entire pot of coffee in one hand and his crutch in the other. Maybe now he’s more determined this time, he can force results—or, at least, something mildly promising. The results from the tests on the lab rats from before couldn’t be _completely_ useless, could they?

Gokudera makes a mental note to give Shamal a call the instant he finds out what happened. Maybe the doctor would have some insight as to why his experiment was failing so horribly once it was implanted in a living being. Gianini’s advice has been invaluable, but the guy’s specialty is technology—the nuances of the human body and its reactions to foreign substances? Not so much Gianini’s specialty. But if Gokudera could get Shamal’s cooperation…

He doesn’t know why he hadn’t thought of contacting Shamal sooner, but now that he’s got some good, strong caffeine in his system, it makes perfect sense now. The thought gives him some hope as he steps into his lab and stares down the latest set of lab rats for the next round of testing.

“Don’t let me down now, fuckers,” Gokudera mutters, tapping the top of the cage of squeaking rodents for emphasis.

 

 

 

 

“You haven’t been stretching enough, have you?”

Gokudera winces, avoiding the physical therapist’s accusing stare as he tries to will his sore knee to bend properly. “I’ve been going through all the exercises,” he offers lamely. It’s true, he just hasn’t been doing _all_ the exercises _every_ day. Who has time for that kind of bullshit, anyway?

There’s a soft sigh—Gokudera swears he can hear a _tsk_ ing noise forming on the therapist’s tongue, but it never comes to full fruition. “I don’t know how else to emphasize the importance of keeping up these exercises every day, other than to tell you that you won’t get rid of the crutch if you don’t do them. You can replace that crutch with a cane if you’d like.”

With a sharp glare at the enem— _physical therapist_ , Gokudera doesn’t appreciate the tone of voice being used on him. He uses it often enough himself, but the sarcasm doesn’t sound so brilliant when it’s aimed in his direction. But he can tell that when he actually does the exercises on schedule, it doesn’t ache as much. The asshole has a point; Gokudera simply doesn’t want to admit it.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he says instead.

He concludes business with the physical tortur— _therapist_ as quickly as he can, making a show of using his crutch correctly to hobble out of the office with a scowl. For his efforts, he gets a small expression of satisfaction from the therapist’s stony face, which is enough for him to know he’s still improving—the bastard just doesn’t want him to know it yet.

The crutch gets used only every other step once Gokudera’s completely away from the building. It makes his knee ache, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t keep it up. At this point, he has half a mind to contact Shamal to see if the old coot has anything up his sleeve for joint injuries.

 

 

 

 

Shamal doesn’t sound the least bit amused over the phone.

Then again, Gokudera is the master at pushing all of Shamal’s buttons, just to see what kind of entertaining reaction he can garner out of the old man. He knows it’s a bad habit. It doesn’t change the fact that he does it anyway, despite the possibility that one of these days, Shamal will give up on him and won’t help him at all.

Gokudera pokes at a cage full of squeaking mice as he argues over the phone in angry Italian. “You’re telling me that you’re not only in the country, you’re _in town_ —but you won’t come help me out with a small little project?”

_“What the hell kind of notion makes you think I’d want to see your sniveling face, brat?”_ comes the equally irritated voice over the other end of the phone.

“Because!” Gokudera gestures wildly around the lab (not that Shamal can see him, but it’s one piece of his Italian blood that he hasn’t quite fully purged from his system). “I promise you’ll be interested in it when you see what I’m working on.”

A pause, and then, _“You’re the genius child. Go study the anatomy more, dipshit. I’m not coming over there just because you think you have something cool to show me. Hell no.”_

Gokudera growls into the phone in frustration. “Damn it, Shamal! You know that a doctor’s intuition isn’t something that can be so easily picked up from books! Come on, don’t you want to be a part of changing history?”

_“Like that ever fucking matters.”_

“I’ll tell you what,” Gokudera says, negotiating. “I’ll even let you put your name first on the research report when it’s published. How’s that?”

_“Find a doctor who wants the credit to work for you, then.”_ Another pause, and the doctor adds gruffly, _“Use some arnica for the knee—it’ll help cut down the swelling.”_ The line clicks and goes silent.

Swearing in four different languages, Gokudera snaps his phone shut and nearly caves to the urge to sling it across the room. Instead, he grips it tightly in his hand and shoves it into his pocket (none too gently), sitting down harshly at the lab table in front of the cage of mice. The movement jars his knee a bit, which only makes him swear more. He _needed_ Shamal to be on board for this project—ever since he realized that the technology wasn’t only _useless_ in bullet form, but also impractical, he knew he was going to need a good doctor to work with. Someone he could trust. Despite his bad history with Shamal, Gokudera at least knew he could trust the man.

Gritting his teeth, he glares down the cage that once held a writhing, squirming multitude of white lab rats—all now strewn about in various states of distressed rigor mortis. It isn’t a technological issue, really; it’s a problem with the anatomy of antibodies. Gokudera knows next to _nothing_ about immunology, other than what he can remember from biology classes and from what he can glean of advanced texts on medicine.

_Maybe there’s another way around this._ He taps the end of a pencil against his latest round of data. Or maybe his techonology _is_ the root cause of the problem—Gokudera makes a note to contact Gianini as soon as the man is back in the country from his vacation.

In either case, he still isn’t making much progress, and it’s _frustrating_. Scratching at his head irritably, he’s finding it more and more difficult to think straight. He doesn’t usually have this much trouble thinking his way through his own problems; every time he tries to focus down, the words blur across the page, and his mind wanders elsewhere, or he just can’t seem to logic his way through the issue at hand.

In the back of his mind, he knows his behavior isn’t normal—not for him. There’s a damaged part of his mind that he has to work around, the part that doesn’t want to acknowledge what he’d been through with more recent events. The harder he focuses, the more _that_ will come to the forefront, and that’s something he has to avoid at all costs.

But even though he knows what the root cause really is, he isn’t really sure he’s ready to face it. Not yet.

Not alone.

Yamamoto hasn’t been around very much in the last few days, and as much as Gokudera gripes and bitches about Yamamoto’s mother hen tendencies, he provides a calming presence. Without Yamamoto, Gokudera’s feeling restless—and even though he’s sleeping with the smiling idiot, it doesn’t mean he’s willing to admit that he really _needs_ Yamamoto here.

Gokudera flips open his phone again, wondering if he can get away with a mild e-mail to see what Yamamoto’s up to (without sounding desperate, of course). But again, when he tries to think of something— _anything_ —to say, he comes up empty. It’s a similar issue to his ability to concentrate—

A soft squeak makes him jump. Frowning, he looks over at the cage littered with rat bodies, and when he sees nothing, he takes a deep breath and tells himself he’s hearing things.

There’s another squeak, this time with some movement from one of the “dead” rats.

Gokudera takes a deep breath as the rat twitches, rolling itself drunkenly off its back and onto its feet. A few twitches of its whiskers, a hesitant sniff at the air, and in moments, the rat is moving around as if nothing happened (aside from the death of its cage-mates).

Exhaling the breath Gokudera almost forgot he was holding, he snorts wryly. Maybe he doesn’t need Shamal’s help after all—not yet. For now, he’s got more tests to run.

 

 

 

 

“Gokudera.”

Snapping his head up from the microscope he’s looking through, Gokudera turns and blinks at the figure shadowing the doorway at the entrance to his lab. The part of his mind that isn’t poring over test results and the information he’s gathering from the microscope reminds him that it’s Yamamoto standing there. Looking _pissed_.

(They haven’t seen each other— _awake_ —for more than a grand total of thirty minutes in the last week.)

“It’s three in the morning,” Yamamoto says flatly, though there’s a hint of exhaustion creeping into his voice. “Don’t you think it’s time to give it a rest?”

Gritting his teeth, Gokudera pushes his glasses up past his forehead, moving his hair out of his face with them. He’s feeling a little indignant; it’s not like Yamamoto has been present much lately, either.

“ _Hello_ to you too, bastard,” Gokudera growls. “What do I owe the honor of your presence?”

Yamamoto visibly flinches at the barbed insult—he jerks, then looks down at his feet, shuffling them one, two steps before he stills again. It’s quiet for a painful handful of seconds, which feel like full minutes in the tension-thick air.

“It’s… I didn’t really have much of a choice,” Yamamoto finally says, lamely. He looks like he wants to say something more, so Gokudera gives him a few moments’ chance to speak his mind.

It doesn’t happen.

Scoffing, Gokudera viciously pulls his glasses back down to his nose. “If you just came down here to tell me to go to sleep, you’ve got another thing coming.”

_That_ comes out as more of a challenge than Gokudera had planned it to sound. But once the words are out of his mouth, he can’t take them back—his pride demands that he stands up to the challenge he’s just doled out. Stiffening his back as he glares down Yamamoto, _daring_ him to say or do something about it, he refuses to let Yamamoto know that he’s tired (and therefore snappish, and therefore says things he know he shouldn’t).

Yamamoto snorts softly. “So what if I did?”

“Better luck next time.” Gokudera turns back to the microscope, mentally reminding himself to change the codes on his lab’s lock as soon as the idiot’s out.

Yamamoto doesn’t move. Gokudera has his back turned, but his nerves are tingling with Yamamoto’s presence behind him. The longer the man spends away, the more _aware_ of his presence Gokudera becomes when he’s actually around—and that, too, pisses Gokudera off. Possibly more than the recently frequent absences do.

He never thought he’d admit (even to himself) that he might _miss_ the Rain Guardian.

The only warning he has is a whisper of fabric before there’s a large, strong hand gripping his bicep. Jumping and blinking in shock—he hadn’t even noticed when Yamamoto moved across the room—Gokudera tries to jerk his arm away, but it’s stuck in a desperate vice grip.

“Let go, you asshole!” he snarls. “Can’t you see I’m busy?”

Yamamoto doesn’t say anything; he simply stares down into Gokudera’s eyes with an icy fire burning in his wide hazel eyes. The serious gaze takes Gokudera by surprise, and the next protest sticks in his suddenly dry throat.

“I’m only going to say this once, Gokudera,” Yamamoto says coldly (Gokudera shivers). “You may be able to carry on, pretending like there’s nothing out of the ordinary right now. But _I_ _can’t keep this up anymore_ , not like this. It’s only going to get worse if we keep ignoring the issue.”

The words hit Gokudera like a shot of ice water to his veins, making his nerves crawl, because—there’s a familiar Italian drawl in the back of his mind that he can’t trust to keep its dead mouth shut. There’s a history hiding in the darkest corners of his mind, one of his darkest hours—and _goddamn it_ , he doesn’t want to talk about this. He doesn’t _ever_ want to talk about it.

He’s shaking his head violently before he even realizes he’s doing it. “No. _Fuck_ no, we’re not talking about it right now.”

Yamamoto doesn’t argue, but doesn’t hesitate as he shifts his grip on Gokudera’s arm and bodily hauls him towards the lab’s exit. With an indignant squawk, Gokudera tries to use his weight to his advantage, but with his bum knee it’s hard to find solid enough footing to pull away. Yamamoto doesn’t even look like he’s _trying_ as he simply half leads, half drags Gokudera down the hall, back towards their apartment. Typically, Gokudera wouldn’t have too much trouble wrenching his way out of _any_ grip, but it’s a testament to just how physically weakened he is that he can’t even free himself from a simple one-handed grip. Yamamoto isn’t even squeezing his arm hard enough to hurt—just enough to firmly lead.

“Let me go, you asshole!”

Yamamoto ignores him as they approach the doorway. A one-handed jingling of keys, and Yamamoto has their door open and Gokudera halfway through it before Gokudera finally frees himself. Feeling humiliated and furious, Gokudera balls a fist, pulls it back, and punches Yamamoto square in the jaw. Yamamoto takes a step back, but doesn’t flinch with the blow. Instead, he stands up straighter, looking Gokudera directly in the eyes—Gokudera can’t keep the challenge out of his own face, and he knows it—and a second later Yamamoto pushes him the rest of the way into the apartment. While Gokudera hops on his good leg and tries to catch his balance, Yamamoto slams the door behind him and whirls, eyes blazing.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Yamamoto snarls.

“What’s wrong with— _ha!_ What the hell is wrong with _you_ , asshole?! When I told you I didn’t want to talk, I meant it!”

Yamamoto’s jaw works angrily, but he manages to keep his voice even. “You and I both know we have things to discuss—and don’t you _dare_ act like it’s just me avoiding the issue, Gokudera,” he says, stopping Gokudera’s protesting interruption halfway through.

Yamamoto sighs, leaning back against the door and sliding down until he’s sitting on the floor, long legs sprawled out in front of him. He suddenly looks tired, worn; a little aged, with stubble dusting his chin and upper lip. The anger isn’t there anymore when he gazes back up at Gokudera.

“Look, you know I’m not one to push for answers from you, especially when I know you don’t really want to give them right now. But even you have to agree that some of these personal issues need to be dealt with for the sake of the _famiglia_ ,” Yamamoto finally says, after a moment. His tone is softer this time around, almost like he’s talking down a cornered wild animal. “I need to know what happened—I need to know why Giacomo’s faction thinks you’re such a threat.”

_I need to know why you keep pushing me away_ —it goes unsaid, but Gokudera can plainly hear the words in Yamamoto’s pained voice.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Gokudera _knew_ this was going to happen—knows that he’s going to have to talk about it, because Vongola still means everything to him. He stares down at his feet for a moment, the anger draining out of him like a sieve, the sound of Giacomo’s deranged laughter bouncing off the walls of his skull like a half-remembered nightmare, and suddenly he wants nothing more than a good, stiff drink.

“Whiskey, on the rocks,” he says as though to a bartender, looking back up at Yamamoto. Even as Yamamoto begins to look confused, he adds, “Then we’ll talk.”

Yamamoto nods—slowly at first, then more assuredly. “Okay.”

 

 

 

 

Even with alcohol running thickly through his veins, Gokudera finds it easier to talk when he talks like it’s about someone else. The verbal abuse, the physical blows that fall in his memory—they’re falling on someone else, and he’s standing on the sidelines; a quiet fly-on-the-wall, an observant bystander. It takes him some time to get there. And when he reaches that place, the words flow from his mouth, only a little slurred by the fourth round of whiskey he’s downed in the last fifteen minutes.

“The first thing they did,” Gokudera says, licking the alcohol off his lips and giving Yamamoto a pointed stare, “was try to patch up the gunshot wound Giacomo almost killed me with.”

Yamamoto winces over his own glass of whiskey—first glass, barely touched, Gokudera notices belatedly—but doesn’t say a word. After spending so much time with him during his rehabilitation, Gokudera figures that Yamamoto knows exactly which wound he’s referring to.

“No painkillers, nothing—they told me that if I told them what they wanted, they’d give me morphine.” Gokudera snorts, taking another quick swallow of the whiskey. “I told them to take their morphine, and to shove it where the sun don’t shine. Even said it in Russian so that the bastard would understand _exactly_ what I was saying. Hah, he didn’t like that so much—but he didn’t really do anything to me other than just leave me alone at the time. Y’know, surgery hurts like a _sonofabitch_ when they’re not drugging you to the gills.”

He absently notices the frown forming across Yamamoto’s brow, but what he _sees_ is a damp, musty concrete holding cell with one or two stark lights swinging from the low ceiling.He still feels the sharp springs from the worn thin mattress on a rickety, rusty bedframe as they gouge into his back. The words don’t stop; though the more he speaks, the more difficult it becomes to separate past from present.

_The pain comes in waves—radiates from the center of his lower back, spreads like fire down his veins and makes his stomach lurch and ears roar and toes tingle from the intensity. Oh god, it’s taking everything he’s got to keep from offering up the cipher to his G-script just to get some semblance of relief, but all he has to do is remember what he’s protecting._

_And remember Giacomo’s sneer as he betrayed Vongola._

_The anger is almost more effective than the desire to protect, and Gokudera is_ furious _. He’s angry with Giacomo for deceiving him, but he loathes himself even more for not having seen it sooner. All of the other traitors in his faction made sense in light of the fact that Giacomo was involved. Fury is almost as intense as pain in his muddled mind, and it gives him some measure of satisfaction to know that every little bit of prodding, goading, resisting he can manage here, the more Giacomo will experience the same blinding, painful wrath._

_The frazzled Italian physician who performed the surgery on Gokudera’s gunshot wound has cold fingers, Gokudera notes as they prod at the sutures on his back. It stings and aches, but the pain doesn’t linger as much as it did before. The doctor sounds reluctant when he explains that the wound is healing well—there’s a hint of disgust in his voice, but Gokudera can tell it’s not directed at him. But the moment the doctor proclaims him a survivor, the doctor is hauled out of the room and the fists come out._

__Gokudera shudders and pauses for a moment, staring down at the ice cubes melting in the glass in his hands. He can feel Yamamoto’s eyes on him, but he doesn’t think he has the heart to see the expression he knows Yamamoto is likely wearing. Part of him takes pity on Yamamoto—after all, he was present for the aftermath, so he knows the outcome of the story at hand. Gokudera pulls one of the ice cubes into his mouth, sucks the whiskey off it as he thinks for a minute, then spits the ice cube back into the glass when the insides of his cheeks start to go numb.

“I’ll spare you the gory details,” he says, finally. “You already know how _that_ turned out.”

“What did they want from you?” Yamamoto asks. His voice sounds strained, like he swallowed a ball of dust and choked on it, but he manages to keep it even, Gokudera notices, impressed.

“Those blueprints you brought back from the room they had me in?” Gokudera tilts his chin up, finally looking Yamamoto straight on. “You already know what they are, don’t you.”

Yamamoto nods hesitantly, but doesn’t seem to really understand. “It’s a project you’re working on.”

Gokudera snorts—it’s almost a relief to know that not even Yamamoto knows what exactly is going on in his lab, so how could Giacomo know?—and shakes his head slightly. “Yes, but do you know what that project _is_?”

Furrowing his brow in concentration, Yamamoto looks almost like he did all those years ago when they were in high school, and Gokudera was trying to tutor him in geometry. (Yamamoto was flunking at the time, and was at risk of losing his spot on the baseball team.) After a moment, he says, “Honestly, I couldn’t tell you, but it’s obviously something important. You wouldn’t even tell _me_ what you were working on.”

Flicking a cigarette out of the crumpled pouch in his pocket, Gokudera ignores Yamamoto’s pointed glare as he lights it up and takes a drag. Blowing it slowly through his nose, he considers what Yamamoto’s relationship means to him— _really_ means to him. Even though he’s all but disbanded his own group of subordinates because of too many risks from the various defectors (especially after Giacomo’s betrayal), Gokudera knows to his very core that he can trust Yamamoto with his life. But it’s still hard to muster the courage to share something that he’s kept very close to himself for so long.

“Tell me, Yamamoto—what do you remember about the Byakuran we faced all those years ago?” Gokudera asks after a moment. “What made him so dangerous?”

Frowning again, Yamamoto replies, “He could share his knowledge and experiences with himself across divergent universes… right?”

Gokudera almost laughs, because sometimes he forgets that Yamamoto isn’t all brawn. “But he couldn’t travel across those universes himself,” Gokudera adds.

“But what about Ghost—oh.” Yamamoto cuts himself off, nodding slowly as he remembers how much of a liability Ghost ended up being for Byakuran in the long run. Then he suddenly straightens in his chair, eyes widening as the epiphany strikes. He looks Gokudera straight in the eyes with emotion that’s bordering on wild panic as he grabs Gokudera by the shoulders. “You figured out how.”

The way Yamamoto’s voice raises at the end indicates a question, but the way Yamamoto’s eyes meet his evenly suggest that he knows _exactly_ where Gokudera’s going with the conversation. Gokudera carefully shrugs Yamamoto’s hands away from his arms.

“With the help of the Bovino _famiglia_ , Vongola can manipulate time travel—but that almost wasn’t enough to stop Byakuran the last time,” Gokudera explains. “I thought that if we could out-step Byakuran in his own specialty, maybe it wouldn’t be so difficult this time.”

Yamamoto sits back with a dazed expression as he absorbs the information. Part of Gokudera feels smug that he’s managed to come up with something extraordinary—the part of him that still competes with Yamamoto, on some level—but the more adult half feels exhausted and worn thin over a project he hasn’t even had a chance to finish yet.

“Does it work?” Yamamoto finally asks, eyes bright with curiosity.

“Theoretically,” Gokudera says, “Construction isn’t quite complete yet, so I haven’t had a chance to try it out—though some of my calculations are pointing to a few security issues in the navigational interface before I can even think about putting a human through that machine—”

“Haha, that is _so cool_ ,” Yamamoto says with a broad grin, interrupting Gokudera before he starts getting into more technical issues surrounding his project. It’s been a while since Gokudera’s seen this side of Yamamoto—the wide-eyed, excited-like-a-puppy-with-a-new-toy expression that Yamamoto hasn’t had since… well, since before Giacomo.

Gokudera’s knee-jerk reaction is to retreat to normalcy, stubbornly halting Yamamoto’s excitement by firmly telling him he can’t touch or play with it until it’s done, but he’s having a hard time doing so as guilt gnaws at his stomach.

“Look, Yamamoto…” He stubs his half-smoked cigarette in the ashtray on the kitchen counter. “I… I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.”

Yamamoto’s smile falters, but he waits patiently for Gokudera to continue.

“I was—goddamn it.” He scratches his head uncomfortably, trying to find a better way to say what he knows he needs to say. “I was being really stupid,” he says, finally. “After so many of my hand-picked men turned, I just… I couldn’t…”

“It’s okay,” Yamamoto says solemnly, putting a hand on Gokudera’s shoulder. “I know how hard it can be to trust someone when everyone else seems to be turning their backs on you—I get it.”

“But that wasn’t the issue!” Gokudera snaps, but then grabs for Yamamoto’s hand before he can jerk it back. “I was worried that if I told you, somebody would find out. Y’know, about… about you and me—about _us_ , and I didn’t want something to happen to you because of—”

Again, Yamamoto interrupts him. He reverses the grip Gokudera has on his hand and grabs Gokudera’s wrist, pulling him into a tight embrace. The touch is unexpected, but not unwelcome; Gokudera instinctively leans into Yamamoto’s broad shoulders, relieved to know that Yamamoto isn’t as angry as he’d feared he would be.

“I understand,” Yamamoto says softly, sincerely; his breath ghosts past Gokudera’s neck as he speaks. “Believe me, I understand.”

And for just a moment, everything seems right again in Gokudera’s world.

 

 

 

 

They’ve come to an agreement, of sorts—more of an end-of-the-day routine with an unwritten set of rules. Yamamoto works out at five, cooks dinner at six-thirty, and Gokudera comes back from the office or his lab at that time (or finds Yamamoto at his lab door if he doesn’t). They eat dinner together, Gokudera cleans up the dishes, and they spend time together. The sequence develops mere days after their conversation, and continues on for almost two weeks without interruption.

He’s being brought back into the occasional meeting, and voices don’t go hushed as he walks by in the main offices. There are more reports filtering back to his desk. Inane reports, small issues, but at least they’re better than _nothing_. It’s comforting, Gokudera thinks—almost like he’s being accepted back into the land of the living, breathing Vongola. He’s still on medical leave for his knee, and Yamamoto still hasn’t said a word about that week-long absence he took about two months before, but at least he’s being _included_.

Gokudera gets so wrapped up in tweaking the control panel of the universe-hopping machine that he almost misses the knock on the door. The second round causes his eyes to dart to the clock—it’s almost seven now, and he mutters curses under his breath—and he cautiously stands and stretches his cramped leg muscles before making his way to the lab door.

“Damn it, Yamamoto, I was just on my way—” Gokudera clamps his mouth shut, teeth clicking together sharply once he looks up. _Not Yamamoto_.

“So, brat, you had something you wanted to show me?” Shamal wears a bored expression as he looks Gokudera up and down, before shifting his gaze to the dim lab behind him.

Gokudera stiffens, scowling. “That was over a month ago, asshole,” he growls, having to strongly resist the urge to punch the man in the jaw for even bothering to come at all. But a part of him knows that he still hasn’t made the breakthrough he needs yet, and maybe—just _maybe_ —Shamal can provide him the insight he needs. He steps aside, motioning with a curt jerk of his chin for Shamal to follow. The soft click of the door closing behind him tells him that Shamal’s complying.

“Your limp’s better,” Shamal notes.

With a snort, Gokudera simply says, “Physical therapy. Works wonders.”

(He won’t admit that he has been using arnica as a poultice on his knee at night—it _is_ helping the swelling—because that would mean that he’s listening to Shamal. Which he isn’t.)

The silence behind him radiates arrogance; the bastard probably knows anyway.

After a moment, the footsteps behind him pause as they come closer to the back end of the lab. Gokudera stops, glancing over his shoulder to see Shamal eyeing the skeleton of the universe-hopping machine with a frown.

“I sure as hell hope this isn’t what you were talking about over the phone,” Shamal says dryly. “I don’t even want to _know_ what that thing would require my insight for.”

“Hah.” Gokudera shakes his head. “No, that’s for something else.” He walks over to a table lined with rat cages, each labeled in G-Script. “Over here.”

The frown doesn’t leave Shamal’s face, but he follows silently. Gokudera leads him to a pile of notes on human anatomy, and another pile of notes on biotechnology—all his own research, in G-Script. He watches as Shamal’s eyes linger on the papers, slowly taking in the diagrams. It’s clear the sharp-minded doctor doesn’t need to know G-Script to get some idea of what’s going on.

“What the hell kind of bullshit is this,” Shamal says after a moment.

“It’s a project I’m working on,” Gokudera replies, lamely—he’s not quite sure how to gauge Shamal’s initial reaction, and he _hates_ how it makes him feel like he’s a child all over again.

Shamal flips through a few pages of the nanotechnology notes and snaps, “Well, obviously! What the hell possesses you to dabble in _nanotechnology_ , of all things?”

Gokudera looks down at his notes, then back up at Shamal, meeting his eyes dead on. “I want to be able to protect my family,” he says evenly.

Shamal regards him, blinking. “But what does this have to do with me?”

“Sit down,” Gokudera says with a sigh as he pulls out his desk chair and motions to it. Perching himself on the edge of the desk, feet dangling, he adds, “This might take a while to explain.”

Sitting down, Shamal’s expression schools into something neutral as Gokudera explains. He explains that he’s working on a technology he hopes to be able to turn into a useable nanotech weapon—a weapon that would transfer all damage done from one body to another. Shamal’s eyes narrow in skepticism at first, but as Gokudera goes through all the contingencies he’s come up with, all the theories and tests and roadblocks he’s navigated, the look on Shamal’s face smoothens out into something that hints at interest, and the glint in Shamal’s eyes turns almost deadly.

“—So I’m thinking it might be more practical as a weapon in bullet form, but I haven’t had a chance to prove that my technology works in humans yet, nor that I could even get the nanobots to take if aimed at a target through a bullet, not to mention that the materials I’m using might be toxic to humans in the first place—”

“Wait, wait a goddamned second,” Shamal cuts his excited ramble off with a wave of his hand. “You mean to tell me you’ve managed to get the nanobots to work in trials with lab rats already?”

“Yes—were you listening to a goddamned word I said? Jesus.” Gokudera whips out a cigarette and lights it, taking a long drag.

“Then why the hell am I here?”

“I don’t need you for the technology end, Shamal,” Gokudera says evenly. “I need you to help me figure out how to get nanobots to take in a human. You know, figure out a way to get around the toxicity of the materials in the nanobots, and find a way to keep a human’s immune system from ripping them to shreds in the meantime.” It’s hard to keep from smirking at the way Shamal’s posture gives away his excitement and curiosity. “My knowledge of immunology sucks, though I hear you have a pretty solid background in the field.”

Shamal calmly sits back in his chair as though thinking over his response, though from the glint in his eyes, Gokudera already knows the answer.

“All right,” Shamal says after a moment. “I suppose you’ve piqued my interest sufficiently. What have you got so far?”

Gokudera whips out his mobile and sends a quick e-mail to Yamamoto telling him not to wait up, snaps the phone shut, and turns back to Shamal with a grin.

“You might be surprised,” Gokudera says conspiratorially.

 

 

 

 

Shamal’s input proves to be even more effective than Gokudera had anticipated. Within a week and a half of running tests after using the techniques Shamal suggested, Gokudera’s seeing leaps and bounds of improvement in his rodent test subjects. He hasn’t had a chance to talk to Reborn about borrowing Leon, or to Gianini about the bullet technology that would be required to get it to work, but Gokudera already has the next stages of his experiment set up in his mind.

One evening, after yet another particularly successful day in the lab on both of his projects, he returns to the apartment just before six whistling softly, a smile on his face. He’s looking forward to dinner that evening—Yamamoto promised a surprise—and it’s taking a large amount of willpower to keep from running back.

He’s only down the hall from his apartment when he hears hurried footsteps approaching. Turning his back to the wall and putting his arms up defensively, he lowers them when he sees Ryohei round a corner just down the hall from him. Before Gokudera has a chance to say anything scathing about elephants parading in Vongola’s hallways, his eyes meet with Ryohei’s, and his stomach drops.

“Gokudera,” Ryohei says seriously. ( _So wrong_ , Gokudera thinks, _something’s wrong—Yamamoto!_ ) “I was looking for you—come with me.”

Gokudera doesn’t follow when Ryohei turns to head back down the hallway. “Where’s Yamamoto?” he asks, voice wavering at the edges.

Pausing and casting a saddened glance over his shoulder, Ryohei doesn’t respond at first—and that’s when Gokudera follows. He storms after Ryohei (as best he can with a stiff knee) and grabs him by the arm, forcibly turning him around.

“Where is he?” Gokudera snarls.

Ryohei pulls his forearm out of Gokudera’s grasp, eyes screaming guilt, and replies, “He’ll be okay, but you should come with me. I need to talk to you.”

“What happened?”

“We need to discuss this elsewhere,” is all Ryohei says before he starts walking again. This time, Gokudera follows without complaint, but the worry still claws at his gut like a frightened cat.

The worry melts into panic when Gokudera realizes they’re headed for the infirmary—not that it’s entirely unexpected, but definitely feared. But he stays quiet, suppressing his fears because if they’re in the infirmary instead of the morgue, then it means that at least Yamamoto isn’t dead. Forcing himself to take even, deep breaths, Gokudera doesn’t say a word as Ryohei leads him down the tiled hallways to a room off the emergency reception area.

“I promise, it’s really not hurting all that— _ow_! Haha, well, when you do that it kinda hurts!”

Just hearing Yamamoto’s idiotic voice drains the panic from Gokudera’s limbs, and he suddenly finds himself weak in the knees from relief. He reaches a hand out and finds the wall for support as he stops just long enough to muster up the courage to go into the room. Ryohei’s watching him wearily, but thankfully has just enough brain in that thick skull of his to keep his mouth shut.

“Well, it hurts because you’ve got deep bruising and a few minor fractures,” says an all-too-calm voice from just beyond the door. “Now if you’d just sit still—”

Ryohei takes that moment to knock on the door, which opens a beat later to reveal a harried-looking doctor with a raised eyebrow.

“I brought him,” is all Ryohei says, eyes darting in Gokudera’s direction.

The doctor peeks beyond the door and over to Gokudera, frowning, before he steps back and replies, “Good. Come in; maybe you can talk some sense into my stubborn patient.”

Gokudera resists the urge to smirk, because isn’t this situation all too familiar? Except he’s usually the one being stubborn, and Yamamoto’s usually the one being brought in to “talk some sense.” But part of him is a little angry with Yamamoto for not being more careful.

“Gokudera!” Yamamoto says cheerily, trying to crane his neck so he can see the doorway better. He’s on his stomach on an exam table (well, it looks more like a chiropractor’s table, really), an exasperated nurse applying ice and pressing his head back down.

“Please relax, sir,” she says.

Gokudera frowns at the mottled bruises scattered all across Yamamoto’s back.

“What the hell happened to you, idiot?” he says irritably. If Yamamoto has that much energy, then he can’t be too badly injured.

Yamamoto’s voice is a little muffled by the cushions pressing against his cheeks, but the words come clearly through the hole in the table for his face: “Slammed into a wall.”

“Heh,” Gokudera scoffs wryly. “Like that hasn’t happened to you before.”

Yamamoto doesn’t respond, and hisses when the nurse shifts the ice packs on his back. Cheery as he may sound, it’s obvious that he’s in a lot of pain, and trying valiantly not to show it.

“He cracked a few ribs and one of his vertebrae, and he’s pretty bruised up,” the doctor tells Gokudera. “But if he gets plenty of rest and doesn’t strain himself, the injuries should heal themselves rather well. I’m more concerned about the cut on his chest—”

Gokudera flinches at that. “He got cut?”

“I’m right here!” Yamamoto proclaims, starting to move his head back up, but is shushed by the nurse’s firm hand on the back of his head.

“It’s pretty deep—required fifteen stitches, and we had to treat him for blood loss and some mild poisoning when he came in,” the doctor continues, ignoring Yamamoto’s attempt to interject. “He’s still carrying a mild fever, but I suspect it will be down by morning.”

The worry begins to creep back into Gokudera’s stomach, because it isn’t often that _anyone_ is able to land a blow on Yamamoto, especially on his front.

“How did this happen?” Gokudera asks, trying not to let the edges of panic he’s feeling creep into his voice. He isn’t sure he succeeds.

“He was with me,” Ryohei says from the doorway, startling Gokudera (he’d forgotten Ryohei was still there). “We were on our way back from a routine meeting with Dino Cavallone when we were extre—err, ambushed.”

It isn’t what Gokudera wants to hear, and his stomach feels like it’s trying to climb up his throat. “Who?”

“Not Gesso,” Yamamoto says quickly, voice still muffled by the exam table. “At least, I don’t think so. My language skills suck, but I think they were speaking Korean.”

“Shit. _Jopok_.” Gokudera runs a hand through his hair. Turning and narrowing his eyes at Ryohei, he says, “Have you reported this to the Tenth yet?”

“No… not yet,” Ryohei amends quickly at the glare Gokudera’s giving him. “I was going to, but I thought Yamamoto needed to be treated first.”

“I told you, I’m fine— _augh_ , haha, that really hurts,” Yamamoto half-laughs, half-whimpers as the nurse presses ice onto another one of his bruises to prove a point. “C-Can’t you numb it a bit?”

Gokudera bites his lip, the amusement leaving him at their switched positions. It’s obvious that Yamamoto is battling a lot of pain, and watching Yamamoto struggle to keep his agony in check is disturbing Gokudera, on some subconscious level. The idiot doesn’t want Gokudera to know how much pain he’s really in, doesn’t want Gokudera to worry, but he doesn’t realize that it’s already too late. And it doesn’t help to have a new issue added onto old fears.

_Why would the Koreans attack Vongola?_

“How long does he have to stay here?” Gokudera finally asks the physician.

“Well, the best we can do for him right now is reduce the swelling as much as possible, load him up on painkillers, and make sure he rests,” the doctor says. Gokudera can feel the doctor’s eyes on him out of the side of his vision as he’s watching Yamamoto—the man seems to be considering something, but Gokudera isn’t sure what. “If you’re up for it, though, he would recover just as well in his own home as he would here.”

Yamamoto manages to peek up over the top of the exam table without the nurse noticing, his eyes meeting Gokudera’s. While it’s clear that he’s in a lot of pain, Gokudera can’t help but see the pleading there—like a puppy at the pound, saying _please take me home!_ , and it makes the decision for him. He glances back at the doctor, nodding.

“I think that might be a better idea—the idiot might be too stubborn to rest, otherwise,” Gokudera says.

The physician seems pleased at the answer, nodding as he gets his patient ready for discharge. The way Yamamoto’s shoulders relax into the exam table tell Gokudera that he has definitely made the right decision, bringing him home. Now it’s his turn to play nursemaid.

 

 

 

 

“Mmm, I like these sheets—smell like you,” Yamamoto mutters into a pillow as Gokudera settles him into their shared bed. He’s on his side, a curved pillow between his knees, and he’s high as a kite off the painkillers the physician sent with them.

Gokudera snorts, saying, “They smell like laundry detergent because they just got washed, idiot.” Pulling the blanket up to Yamamoto’s shoulders—careful not to put any pressure on Yamamoto’s back—he smoothes the covers before bringing the back of his hand up to check Yamamoto’s forehead for any lingering signs of a fever. The skin is a little warm to the touch, but seems to be improving. “How’s that position? Does it hurt?”

“S’always hurting, but this feels nice.” Yamamoto’s words slur a little as his eyes droop closed. “Better’n the hospital.”

Gokudera can definitely relate to that sentiment. “Just let me know if you need anything—but don’t move too much,” he says the last part in a tone that tries to promise consequences, but falls flat.

“Mm.” The sounds of Yamamoto’s breathing are becoming deeper, but when Gokudera moves to get up, Yamamoto’s hand presses down on his. “Wher’re you goin? Stay.”

With a sigh, Gokudera turns and settles on his side, facing Yamamoto. “I was just going to get my pajamas on, but if you insist…”

Yamamoto’s already drifting off again, this time with a goofy smile on his too-drugged idiot face. Gokudera sighs again, but doesn’t move this time for fear of waking him. Sleep is the farthest thing from his mind right now, though, and instead he spends the night trying to figure out the one burning question that still lingers in his mind.

_Why the Koreans?_

Perhaps when Yamamoto comes off his drug-induced high, Gokudera will get some answers. Until then, all he can do is fabricate his own theories, and hope that none of them are correct.

 

 

 

 

Gokudera hasn’t slept in two days. He tries not to let Yamamoto know, because Yamamoto definitely doesn’t need any other reason to worry right now, but at this point Gokudera’s sure it’s showing in his eyes. Between Yamamoto’s pain medication schedule and his own fears mulling over in his mind, all of his spare moments are consumed with theories. Yamamoto hasn’t spoken about the attack yet, but he’s on such strong painkillers that this doesn’t come as a surprise. The idiot can’t keep his head on straight for more than a few seconds at a time.

Part of Gokudera needs to discuss his theories with the Tenth, to see if he has any insight into what’s going on. But part of Gokudera—the part that can’t resist any small request from Yamamoto—can’t bring himself to leave the apartment for more than a few minutes at a time.

Instead, he’s seated on the plush recliner in the living room with his laptop on his lap, a hot Americano on the coffee table next to him, reading through a screen full of information on his own team of subordinates that he isn’t sure he can trust. Five of them, he notes, hold dual citizenships between Japan and Korea. Two of them have almost zero information past three years ago, and one of them has a tattoo entirely in Korean down his left forearm. As much as his gut reaction is to blame them first for the attack on Yamamoto and Ryohei, Gokudera knows that simply having ties to Korea doesn’t necessarily make them guilty. He needs more information, like whether they have ties to Gesso, or had a direct connection with Giacomo.

_Giacomo_. The bastard’s name brings forward his sneering face, and the image sends a shiver down Gokudera’s spine, makes his jaw clench so tightly that it hurts. He doesn’t know if he’ll ever get over Giacomo’s betrayal, or the fact that Gokudera wasn’t the one who got to kill him.

Shaking the image from his mind, Gokudera focuses on the task at hand. Pouring over the information on his own men, he isn’t finding anything useful. It’s frustrating, but unsurprising. Part of Gokudera wonders if he’s just grasping at straws at this point. Once he realizes that his men’s dossiers aren’t going to yield anything useful, he switches over to hunting down information on the Jopok in the area.

“One of them had a tattoo like his.” Yamamoto’s finger is pointing over Gokudera’s shoulder at the screen, and the sudden presence makes him jump. “I think he might’ve been the ringleader.”

“What are you doing awake?” Gokudera asks, craning his neck to look up at Yamamoto. The swordsman looks worn, exhausted, and his eyes give away the amount of pain he’s in. “You should be resting.”

“Had to go to the bathroom sometime, haha,” Yamamoto replies easily, though his smile’s a bit strained. “I saw the light was on in here.”

Gokudera looks at the clock and shakes his head, flipping the laptop cover closed and standing. “And it’s time for another round of painkillers for you. Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Didn’t hurt that much until I got up,” Yamamoto admits sheepishly. He starts to move to put his hand behind his head, as he usually does when sheepish, but winces and thinks better of it. Taking a few hesitant, wobbling steps into the living area, he finally settles down on the couch with a groan.

“You should’ve gone back to bed instead of wandering out here, then,” Gokudera says, chastising, as he pulls a glass out of the kitchen cabinet and fills it with water from the tap. The bottle of painkillers sits on the kitchen counter, so he grabs it and taps a few pills out into his palm and brings them over to Yamamoto with the glass of water.

Yamamoto murmurs his thanks as he takes the pills with the full glass of water, and then lies down on his side on the couch, stuffing one of the couch pillows between his knees. Gokudera pulls one of the throws off of the ottoman he’d been resting his feet on, flinging it over Yamamoto and gently tucking it in around the edges.

“Not finding anything useful?” Yamamoto asks when Gokudera settles back down with his laptop.

“No, not particularly,” Gokudera replies, “But it helps to know I’m at least looking at the correct group of assholes I’m going to have to go have a talk with.”

Grinning, Yamamoto says, “So you _do_ care!”

“Shut it, idiot.”

Still grinning, Yamamoto’s eyes settle on the laptop, but he doesn’t say anything for a while. Gokudera takes advantage of the momentary silence to continue tapping out queries and scrolling through databases, content to ignore Yamamoto’s presence.

“It wasn’t a random attack,” Yamamoto says after a while, breaking the silence. Gokudera stops typing and looks up, eyebrow raised. “They said they didn’t like that our generation of Vongola is so Japanese.”

Frowning, Gokudera starts to ask a question, but suddenly the answer is so _obvious_ , that he almost wants to smack himself.

“Of course they don’t like it—they think a Japanese generation of Vongola will create unrest for the Jopok running business here.” Gokudera laughs mirthlessly. “And the Gesso would have no qualms with creating unrest here in Japan, on the Tenth Vongola generation’s home turf. In fact, they’d be more than happy to welcome and encourage it.”

“There’s a pretty big ring of human trafficking in that part of town, too,” Yamamoto says. “I’m pretty sure the Jopok are involved, but knowing Tsuna’s stance on trading humans around, they probably didn’t like me snooping around so much, haha.”

Gokudera shoots a glare in Yamamoto’s direction. “So you’ve been looking into this already?” The part where he asks, ‘ _Why didn’t you say something sooner, dumbass?’_ goes unsaid.

Guilt flashes across Yamamoto’s face. “I didn’t want you exposing yourself, yet,” he says. “I started looking into it shortly after… well, when I brought you back from Italy.”

“Then it’s no surprise that you got ambushed.” Part of Gokudera feels relieved at the chance that the attack on Yamamoto has nothing to do with _him_. ( _The mafia world doesn’t revolve around you,_ he tells himself matter-of-factly, but it still doesn’t stop him from having that gut-wrenching worry.) “You were poking around in their business when they were already nervous about our generation’s rise.”

“Ahaha…” Yamamoto winces, but doesn’t defend himself. Instead, he adds, “The only reason I knew about them was because Ryohei said there’s a rumor that they’re dealing directly with the Solntsevskaya Bratva for the human trafficking part of their business. If I hadn’t been looking into the Russians, I wouldn’t have paid any attention.”

At that, Gokudera’s spine stiffens, and again, he stops typing.

“Although Tsuna and I have a theory; since the Russians and the Koreans are allies, and Giacomo had business with them as Gesso, we’ve been thinking that—”

“Byakuran’s trying to form a global anti-Vongola alliance,” Gokudera finishes. “Which means he’s already taking the first step.”

Towards what, he doesn’t say, but they both know what he’s talking about. The future—the one they saw—is already being set in motion. Yamamoto looks away, but doesn’t deny that he and Tsuna have come to that same conclusion.

“Shit,” Gokudera says, snapping his laptop shut. “We need to have a meeting with Tsuna. _I_ want to be in on it, this time.”

Yamamoto grimaces, but nods in agreement. His eyes are drooping closed, and even though he’s managed to stay valiantly awake (and pretty aware) through the entire conversation, it’s becoming obvious that the painkillers are taking their toll. Gokudera puts the laptop away and gets up, moving to the couch to smooth the covers and brush the back of his hand against Yamamoto’s cheek.

“Get some rest,” he says gently, but Yamamoto’s already asleep. He whips out his cell phone and sends the Tenth an e-mail, and then, quietly, leaves the apartment to go to the lab.

He’s running out of time, and he’s still got a lot of work to do.

**_to be continued..._ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> RECOMMENDED LISTENING (part 2):  
> ♪ [the game has changed](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nBR30nIoAg) { daft punk | tron:legacy ost }


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